1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to clothing hangers for coats, shirts, jackets and the like, and more specifically to hangers that are adjustable or readily collapsible and foldable to facilitate mounting clothing on the hangers or easily removing clothing therefrom.
2. Description of Related Art
Coat hangers are widely used throughout the world for temporary or long term storing of clothing items of all kinds. Indeed, many historians credit President Thomas Jefferson as inventor of a forerunner of wooden clothes hangers. Still today, the ubiquitous hanger configuration typically includes wire, wood or plastic looped into a generally triangular shape, with the looped portion terminating in an upwardly projecting hook suitably bent or otherwise fabricated to extend over a stationary hanging rod or rail usually tucked within a closet or wardrobe cabinet. A horizontal run or traverse of wire, plastic or wood element interconnects laterally extended clothing support arms or wings.
A great number of hanger variations have emerged over the years, most of which include special projection hooks, bottom traverse elements in the form of rods with or without trouser clips, and variously padded wings or support arms.
Generally speaking, the vast majority of hangers are alike, particularly with respect to the intersection angle included where the garment support arms or wings slope downwardly from a suspension point (generally a hook) thereabove. Regardless of hanger size, the suspension hook and wing slope, pitch or inclination usually are virtually identical throughout the industry. Some innovative attempts have been undertaken to offer more variation or broader accommodation for differing types of clothing or various shapes and sizes, as will be discussed below. However, these obviously have fallen short in terms of customer preference and have not been commercially successful.
Zenk received Patent grant U.S. Pat. No. 2,653,739 for an early version of collapsible hangers wherein a concealed spring normally urges hanger arms into clothing support mode (outstretched), and a latch secures that condition. LaMont received U.S. Pat. No. 4,673,115 for collapsible coat hanger formed entirely of molded polypropylene. The hanger includes a hook supported by a body member having right and left hanger arms attached thereto by living hinges. Collapsing the hanger to folded mode is done by manual pressure on the arms. Manually pressure is required to return it to operational mode where the living hinges snap into position to stabilize arm extension.
Braunstein's U.S. Pat. No. 2,716,513 describes a collapsible hanger requiring the user's to grasp the arms and provide manual pressure such that resilient nubs are forcefully released from resilient sidewalls; then to place the hanger in un-collapsed mode the nubs are returned by force to their previous position between resilient walls. Hamilton's U.S. Pat. No. 1,040,942 discloses a collapsible coat-hanger where the hook stem serves to latch the arms in operative position. When the stem is manually shifted the hanger can be manually folded for storage.
Helms received U.S. Pat. No. 4,186,857 for a coat hanger with first and second arms and a hook mutually pivoted on a pin so as to rotate relative to one another for manual folding from a use configuration to a storage configuration. The pivot pin engages one of the arms through a slot extending in the arm permitting the arm to slide relative to the pin to engage a projection on the arm with an abutment on the other arm, thereby holding the coat hanger in its open configuration. In U.S. Pat. No. 3,858,770, Murray describes a hanger with folding arms locked in place by a manually moved ball on a lower end of a hook. The ball engages concave areas of the arms for locking engagement with the ball.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,979,721A granted to Curtis shows a garment hanger having downwardly foldable, pivoted arms wherein a spring between the pivoted arms is compressed when the pivoted arms are in an operative position and a preferably slidable switch latch controls off-axis movement of a central portion of the spring to positively control movement of the pivoted arms between an operative position and a folded position and vice-versa.
Keller's collapsible clothes hanger illustrated and described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,730,757 employs a resilient band to bias the arms in outstretched position. Manual pressure forces the arms to collapse. In U.S. Pat. No. 2,728,499 issued to Mueller et al. describes a collapsible hanger where the “legs” are manually pressed together overcoming bias of a bow spring.
Rodum received U.S. Pat. No. 4,948,019 for a collapsible clothes hanger. The Rodum hanger includes a swivel hook mounted on a central hub. Hanger arms are spring-coupled to an extension of the hub. Rodum's arms may be manually pivoted to a folded position and latched with interlocking elements. Unlatching requires manual twisting of the hub. Springs then return the arms to an open (outstretched) position where they are manually fixed in operating position by central latching elements.
The Ozowa U.S. Pat. No. 5,397,037 features an inner compression spring maintaining pins (or short shaft elements) into recesses thus locking hanger arms in a general horizontal mode. Downward manual pressure on the hanger hook shaft overcomes spring force and causes the shaft elements to move into an arcuate pathway permitting the arms to swing downwardly.
The relatively complex Ozowa construct and the hanger apparatuses detailed in others of the above-noted patent documents reveal hangers with collapsible arm features, but require two hands for operation and/or necessitate a significant plurality of intricate and close fitting interacting parts. Increased structural complexity correspondingly increases manufacturing investment and invites opportunity for malfunction.
By way of contrast, the present invention is extraordinarily elegant and simple in form and sturdy in construction. Manufacturing and assembling a commercial version with a minimal number of parts can clearly be done at reasonable cost. The Consumer operation of the unique hanger will require no since its manipulation is intuitive from it visible elements. It requires a minimum of parts to accomplish dual functions, namely: 1. simple, progressive arm slope adjustment (to meet unique requirements of each garment; 2. rapid, one-hand activated arm-drop for instant separation from a garment supported thereon. This invention springs into action when its package is opened.